Visualization Overview This visualization represents a "true color" band combination (Red = 1, Green = 4, Blue = 3) of data collected by the MODIS instrument on the NASA Terra satellite. The imagery is most similar to how we see the Earth’s surface with our own eyes. It is a natural looking image that is useful at a global and regional scale. At its highest resolution, this visualization represents the underlying data scaled to a resolution of 250m per pixel at the equator. The MODIS Corrected Reflectance product provides natural-looking images by removing gross atmospheric effects such as Rayleigh scattering from the visible bands. By contrast, the MODIS Surface Reflectance product, which is also available in the Living Atlas, provides a more complete atmospheric correction algorithm that includes aerosol correction and is designed to derive land surface properties. In clear atmospheric conditions the Corrected Reflectance product is similar to the Surface Reflectance product, but they depart from each other in the presence of aerosols. Multi-Spectral Bands The following table lists the MODIS bands that are utilized to create this visualization. See here for a full description of all MODIS bands. Band Description Wavelength (µm) Resolution (m) 1 Visible (Red) 0.620 - 0.670 250 3 Visible (Blue) 0.459 - 0.479 500 4 Visible (Green) 0.545 - 0.565 500 Temporal Coverage By default, this layer will display the imagery currently available for today’s date. This imagery is a "daily composite" that is assembled from hundreds of individual data files. When viewing imagery for “today,” you may notice that only a portion of the map has imagery. This is because the visualization is continually updated as the satellite collects more data. To view imagery over time, you can update the layer properties to enable time animation and configure time settings. Currently, this layer is available from present back to the start of the mission (February 24th, 2000). NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS), NASA Worldview, & NASA LANCE This visualization is provided through the NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS), which are a set of standard services to deliver global, full-resolution satellite imagery for hundreds of NASA Earth science datasets and science parameters. Through its services, and the NASA Worldview client, GIBS enables interactive exploration of NASA's Earth imagery for a broad range of users. The data and imagery are generated within 3 hours of acquisition through the NASA LANCE capability. Esri and NASA Collaborative Services This visualization is made available through an ArcGIS image service hosted on Esri servers and facilitates access to a NASA GIBS service endpoint. For each image service request, the Esri server issues multiple requests to the GIBS service, processes and assembles the responses, and returns a proper mosaic image to the user. Processing occurs on-the-fly for each and every request to ensure that any update to the GIBS imagery is immediately available to the user. As such, availability of this visualization is dependent on both the Esri and the NASA GIBS services.
NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS)
True Color - Corrected Reflectance (MODIS / Terra)